VISUAL INTEREST: CROSS CONTOUR

The topic of this study is a concept that I learned in a college drawing class but never connected to set design or film.

“While contour lines describe edges, cross-contours describe form and volume. These lines can follow planes of form, moving around and across objects as well as through them. Think of a topographical map--the lines move across the terrain. Cross-contour lines do the same thing.”
- University of Delaware, http://www1.udel.edu/artfoundations/drawing/crosscontour.html

Below is a cross contour example by Matthew Young at UT Dallas:

And Brendan Monroe:

But how does this apply to film? Looking at the development art work for the first three Star Wars movies, Ralph McQuarrie used cross contour as a shared design language across the worlds.

McQuarrie’s vision of Hoth takes this concept further by adding contrast of ice textures for more visual breakup: organic in background and straight/cross-contour in the middle ground

 Batman also features organic forms contrasted with high frequency cross contour design.

Cross contour appears in nature. Like in waves:

I found it interesting to see this more texture contrast like in the Hoth concepts. Texture contrast of cross contour and foliage can be found in landscapes like Mu Cang Chai in Vietnam:

An example of rock texture contrast in Antelope canyon:

To wrap up this study, here is a special case for this concept in Spike Jonze’s Apple commercial:

I found Spike Jonze’s piece most interesting for combining the concept of “pixel stretching” (example by Maurizio Bongiovanni)

with cross contour similar to pieces from Sebastian Brajkovic: